But still, I think that Wesley Snipes is
being treated unfairly. As you can see from this quote
by Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Douglas
Shulman, the deck was stacked against Snipes:

"There is no secret formula that
eliminates a person's tax obligations, nor are there any
special exceptions," he said. "The majority of Americans
pay their taxes timely and accurately. Those who
willfully violate the law must be held accountable."

I may not be reading this right, but just
because Wesley Snipes doesn't know the secret formula
that eliminates a person's tax obligations, he's going
to have to do 3 years in the pen?! THAT'S the
crime!

What makes this most unjust of all is that
Wesley Snipes was obviously not qualified to stand
trial. I am not a lawyer, but I have watched such
programs as: L.A. Law, Law and Order, Law and
Order:SVU, Law and Order: CI and Matlock
for years, and I know a little something about
jurisprudence, thank you very much. Snipes is obviously
not qualified, based on the following quote he gave
today:

"I am an idealistic, naive,
passionate, truth-seeking, spiritually motivated
artist, unschooled in the science of law and
finance"

People, law and finance are not
sciences!!! Obviously Wesley does not understand what is
going on, and cannot be held accountable for his
actions!

Another reason he can't be held
accountable is that he was just following the advice of
an expert: Eddie Ray Kahn, founder of American
Rights Litigators and the Guiding Light of God
ministries. According to the website, Taxes.com,
Kahn's arguments are “so utterly juvenile and worthless
as to barely worth the space I am using to type this
sentence.” Kahn doesn't seem to believe in the 16th
Amendment, and thinks that since the IRS is not part of
the government, we don't have to pay income tax. He also
thinks we can choose not to participate in Social
Security.

Kahn is an idiot. But he used his
Svengali-like powers of persuasion to ensnare one of the
most beloved actors of our time in his downfall. This
would be funny if we were talking about, say, David
Hasselhoff (who is HUGE in Germany), but Wesley Snipes?
Come on, people!

Snipes' attorneys had tried to persuade
the judge that Snipes had been unfairly targeted, that
the prosecutors were "big game hunters" who ignored
Kahn's 4,000 other clients to go after
Snipes. In a response that makes the Sacco
and Vanzetti case look like an episode of Judge Judy,
U.S. District Judge William
Terrell Hodges said:

"One of the main purposes which drives
selective prosecution in tax cases is
deterrence...In some instances, that means those of
celebrity stand greater risk of prosecution. But
there's nothing unusual about it, nor is there
anything unlawful about it. It's the way the system
works."

Well, that may be how the "system" "works"
for "Judge" Hodges, but to me that sounds plain wrong.
As I said, when I read this, I was shocked, and I
immediately resolved to take action, because as Founding
Father Thomas Jefferson once said: "All tyranny needs to
gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to
remain silent." Well, I have a good conscience, and a
website, and I will not be silent!

I urge all right-thinking Americans to write to
President Bush Obama and demand that he
commute Snipes' sentence. L. Scooter Libby (former Chief
of Staff to Vice-President Cheney) outed an active CIA
agent (Valerie Plame) in violation of Federal law, and
President Bush commuted his sentence. All Snipes did was
follow bad advice, and willfully avoid paying taxes for
a decade. That's hardly as bad.

I'll leave you with the following poem,
written by Pastor Martin Niemoller during World War II:

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.